


Clandestine

by Anonymous



Category: TWICE (Band), 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Bullying, Bus Stop, F/M, Fluff, Meet-Cute, but in the past
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:29:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23666137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Son Chaeyoung meets a black clad form on a rainy night.
Relationships: Jeon Jungkook/Son Chaeyoung
Kudos: 17
Collections: Anonymous





	Clandestine

**_Seoul, Early Spring of 2020_ **

The meeting started thirty minutes late and ran for over three hours and so now Chaeyoung is stuck in the bus stop waiting for the last bus to her little hole-in-the-wall Jamsil apartment. It’s cold and dark and her stomach growls at the nearby food stall packed with salary-men getting drunk. It was a rough Tuesday, she thinks, eyes trained to the droplets of water hanging by the edge of the shelter’s roof. Suddenly she misses her grandma’s _buddae jiggae_ and _ppajeon_ , salty and warm beneath the coziness of her country house where they grew up – her and her little brother.

They had been happy then. The lingering promise of the Cube application form a trendy woman gave her at the bus stop when she was about to depart from Seoul back home after visiting her parents, small bowls of stew and vegetable stir-frys, the discussion of what kind of part time job she should take when she gets to Seoul as a trainee.

Her grandmother had phoned her mother, asking for a new bag and new pair of shoes for her, maybe a little bit of spare for her to get a haircut. She and Jeonghoon had watched giddily, chopsticks missing their mouths.

It was so long ago.

Maybe she should go visit. Bring Jeonghoon with her, even though it would almost be impossible as he is in the midst of his debut preparation with seven other guys who are all older than him. Which makes her worry sometimes. Worry that he would fall under peer pressure, fearing about being less cool than all the older boys he is going to debut with. But thankfully she knows him. Jeonghoon is confident and has seen harsher reality than half the trainees who came from fancy neighborhood in Seoul. Cheoin-gu taught him good. Maybe that’s why he is the one set for debut instead of her.

She chuckles bitterly, eyes getting slightly blurry, then she turns her head away to blink and that’s when she sees it. A form – a figure, clad in black speeding up right into her, stopping just enough not to collide with the bench she’s siting on. The figure rests its hands on its knees, heaves heavily, making his presence known as Chaeyoung realizes it’s a male human person.

As he lifts his head, Chaeyoung realizes it’s not just any male human person. It’s –

“Don’t say it! Please,” he begs, nose flaring as he breathes in a lungful of air.

Startled, she leans back and start doing a hopefully translatable gesture of zipping her mouth with two fingertips while shaking her head.

Jeon Jeongguk looks relieved, straightening his back and putting his hands on his hips.

“I was – was –“

“Mobbed?” she suggests sympathetically.

“Yeah – yeah, that,” Jeon Jeongguk says, a finger wiggling mindlessly.

When Chaeyoung just nods without saying anything, he says, “There’s still bus at this hour?”

“Yeah, last one,” she says nonchalantly, interest piqued, she then adds, “Never rode one late at night?”

He finally looks at her, _really_ looks at her for the first time. “Never rode one in the last… I don’t know, two years? Two years and a half?”

Not surprising at all, really. Jeon Jeongguk, idol-actor turns model and TV personality. Built his career up as a member of the pop trio Hwanggeum Boys at fourteen, quit his group when his five-year contract deal ended and joined an acting agency with his first two dramas gaining high ratings because of the hype, but his subsequent projects all bombed because frankly, he doesn’t have half the skills to appear decent in a TV drama, nor did he seems to enjoy it. His recent interviews are proofs of that, as when asked about acting projects, he just laughed at the camera and stare at it instead of the interviewer. He then got assigned with various modelling contracts as well as variety show appearances until not one single neighborhood mom doesn’t know his name or his favorite food. And with a few drama OSTs getting all-kills on charts, it’s settled. Jeon Jeongguk, _nation’s spring sweetheart,_ earned the moniker because for the last three years, when spring comes, television and billboards all over South Korea’s big cities are filled with his face in various commercials.

So it makes sense, she supposes. She gives an understanding face as silence falls on them.

“You work?” he asks, voice small. He’s taken a seat beside Chaeyoung, hoodie still up but not tightly wrapped around his head like earlier.

Chaeyoung shrugs. “Part-time. I’m an intern.”

“Oh, law?”

“No,” she chuckles, “Auditor, hopefully. Just, still – you know – doing slave jobs. Spending lunch hour photocopy-ing files and such.”

When he doesn’t say anything, she takes it as a cue to continue talking. “I’m still in college.”

“Cool. When are you graduating?”

“In six months, I hope. Doing my senior thesis right now.”

He hums. “You’re a hard worker!”

Chaeyoung is taken by surprise at his cheery tone. She never really thought of him in any way, really, even when she was a trainee. If there’s one assumption she has about him, it would be that he’s a little fake and a bit stuck up. There’s no way a talented singer, dancer, rich as hell person would be as humble as what he shows on TV. Not to mention that he’s easy on the eyes too, more than any guy she ever met, and even more so in real life.

She surprises herself even more after she starts saying, “I was a trainee, too.”

She was expecting a soft gasp and a ‘You were?’ but it never come. A second lapse of silence falls before he takes a breath and asks, “Why did you quit?”

Oh, good question. _Why_. The question is, should she answer it? And if she does, should it be the truth or the opposite? Then again there’s always the option to turn to white lies. The half-truths.

“It’s just – I guess it was not my thing. Not who I’m supposed to be. Thankfully I quit not even a year into it, took the entrance examination, passed, and never looked back.”

“And being an Auditor is?”

The ends of her mouth quirk up. “Are you being sassy?”

“No, no! Just – you don’t seem the type! And not in a bad way, no.”

She was about to quip about her not looking smart enough to mess with math and finance as a profession, but then she realizes why Jeon Jeongguk might think that. Because the whole time they were talking, her fingers can’t stop pinching that piece of skin at the inside of her forearm, very close to the fold of her elbow, usually hidden. A little blue goldfish reddening because of her pinches.

“You were implying that female auditors can’t have tats?”

Jeon Jeongguk raises both hands in a gesture of surrender. “Hey, I just thought you’re too much of a free soul to be stuck in a desk job and a cubicle from nine to five.”

Acting like that, he looks almost cute. Even though he’s around two to three years older than her, but he does – look cute.

But that doesn’t matter because Chaeyoung will not be telling him why she got that tattoo in that one specific place, no matter how she strangely feels like she’s compelled to do it. Because it’s a way more important reason than because it is hidden under her shirt and blazer so it doesn’t show while she’s working.

“Is being a full-time idol less restricting than working in an office?”

Jeon Jeongguk gasps. “Now that’s a full offense. Not fair. I was just trying to get you talking, not attacking your life choices.”

She laughs.

“I wanted to make music, alright. Think I have the talent too. I need lots and lots of practice of course, but I love music and wanted to do it as a profession. It’s just – fate – I think, the stars not lining up for me and all that bull.”

“Fate is not nonsense, or as you said, bull,” he claims firmly, “don’t be ashamed of believing in it.”

“You sound like you do.”

“What?”

“Believe in it.”

“I do,” he smiles, looking up at the starless sky. Chaeyoung’s breath gets caught in her throat as she sees him because he looks like comfort and nostalgia personified. It’s so weird.

Chaeyoung doesn’t really believe in fate. Well, a little. But she was not telling him the exact reason why so she can’t blame him for thinking that. She thinks about the girls she was training with, brimming with hope and ambition, full of drive, too much drive that some of them would inflict pain upon others just to get their ways. She was just a girl raised in a strawberry farm, and they were tall and rich and know all the things about being a grown up. Know that power wins and that sincerity, as nice as it sounds, doesn’t really get you anywhere in such a competitive environment. She was naive and they were immature realists with a few mean streaks.

So. No. She wouldn’t be telling Jeon Jeongguk that two of the fellow trainees at Cube cornered her in the dressing room of the dance studio because she was getting praises for her vast improvement in dancing. The instructor took a liking to her, praising her and making her an example, one fateful night where one of the two, the older one, stabs a dying cigarette on where the blue goldfish is now.

She had cried. Didn’t stop even when she was walking home, feet trembling as her breath falls heavily in restrained sobs. And until now she still wonder, what if she fought back? What if she had stayed and powered through? Maybe if she was strong enough she would be somewhat famous now? Singing songs about having a crush on a guy, wearing pastel mini skirts, welcomed by a crowd in the airport. Meeting Jeon Jeongguk backstage at a variety show and bowing 90 degrees while handing him a signed album of her group instead of under the bus stop shelter on a rainy night after an exhausting meeting.

She breathes in a lungful of air. It’s spring already, she realizes. Jeonghoon’s debut is soon, not even another month.

“My little brother though, he’s debuting soon.”

“The stars lining up for him?”

She looks at him and grins. “Guess so, he’s way more capable of… handling things than I did.”

“Things like what?”

“Oh you know, brutal dance training and diet restriction. The work out routines, almost killed me that one.”

“So that’s the star that rioted from the line!” he jokes, slapping his own thigh. It looks like a harmless joke, nonchalant and easy, but she’s soon made aware that it was a disguised attempt at making her tell her full story by the inquisitive look in Jeon Jeongguk’s eyes as he stops laughing.

Nice bait, but she’s not taking it. And it seems like he knows it too.

“It was hard, yeah, I get it,” he says instead, “I used to cry when one by one people started leaving because they saw no hope in debuting anymore while the world moves on and you just stay there, practicing popping and pushing the capacity of your vocal chords until you almost lose your voice.”

“But you got through it.”

“That I did, but – you know – you have a valid point. Being a full-time idol is almost as bad, especially when you got no guarantee that you will succeed, and people have high expectation on you.”

“And the restraints,” she remarks cheekily.

“And the restraints,” he agrees.

“You have a point too.”

“Yeah?”

“To be an Auditor you also have to go to a university, preferably a high-ranked one, have good scores and study until your eyes hurt and you’re losing sleep. And soon enough you have to take slave jobs to have good reviews and bear the annoying demands of your boss. In a way, it’s just like training before debuting.”

“Hmm.. So long as it is what we want.”

Chaeyoung smiles. It’s not really what she wants but she wants a stable life more than the constant gamble and uncertainty in idol world.

She realizes she might be getting old.

“Yeah, I think, more or less it’s what I want now. Have a job and help my mum. Give back to her and my grandparents. They’ve worked so hard – still are, nurturing strawberries in Cheoin-gu. Refused to step out to the city even once.”

A gust of wind passes, warmer than before. The rain has stopped.

“Hey,” Jeon Jeongguk says carefully, “I’ve come to notice that all the while we’re sitting here, talking about life and stars and being passive aggressive about being idols and auditors, I never catch your name.”

“We’ll never meet each other again, why bother?” she says, hiding a smile.

Jeon Jeongguk open his mouth and closes it again. Chaeyoung can almost see the gears working in his head, then he finally shoves a hand in front of her face and he says, “I’m Jeon Jeongguk, born in the fall of 1997, loves singing and working out and _samgyeopsal_. I just met a lady with a cute tattoo and even cuter mole and an alright face who doesn’t want to tell me her name so now I drop all self-regard and introduce myself to her so she would feel obliged to do it too.”

“My face is just alright?” Chaeyoung says mid-laugh.

“I would say you’re cute if you tell me your name.”

“That would be a tempting offer if I am a little bit inclined to chase validation from you, but I don’t. And also, my bus will be here soon.”

Jeon Jeongguk fakes a look of heartbreak. “Okay then let me guess, at least?”

Chaeyoung shrugs to say ‘Do as you wish’.

“Is it Miyeon? Last name Kim?”

“Wrong,” she cackles.

“Jung Saeri?”

“Wrong.”

“Kim Ahra?”

“Nope.”

“Nope? Of course not. You’re a Chae, aren’t you?”

Her cackles stops slowly, eyes widening. Somewhere down the street, she recognizes the unmistakable swoosh of wheels on wet asphalt, the whir of engine splitting the quiet night. Her bus is almost here but Jeon Jeongguk is figuring her out layer by layer and she doesn’t know what to feel, let alone what to do.

“Son Chaeyoung-ssi, nice to meet you,” he says with the sincerest smile and creases under his eyes. His hoodie is completely down and now she feels the lump forming at the base of her throat.

“How – how?”

Like the cliches in romance movies, Jeon Jeongguk’s eyes light up even more as he point at the vague area of her chest. “Be more careful next time, we don’t want the wrong kind of people to see that.”

She looks down and and blushed. There, the small name tag glistens under the yellow light of the shelter as if grinning at her in a jest.

“Ah, so unfair. You knew me before you even asked me my name.”

“I just want you to tell me by your own will,” he says cheekily. Then, “Quick take it off and hide it.”

She does. Takes it off her blazer and slips it inside the small pocket of her bag. The whir is so near but strangely, she doesn’t wanna go. Not yet.

“What else do you want me to tell you?” she asks, completely on impulse. Somehow Jeon Jeongguk is so, so good at making her say things she never meant to say, even if it is half truths and trivial things. Even if after this, at best, their encounter will be a little creased memory eroded little by little as time passes them by. At worst, it will be labelled as a clandestine affair if somehow without them knowing, someone from dispatch is taking a picture of them chatting under the gleam of shelter lamp.

Jeon Jeongguk follows her to stand up, walking towards where the bus will stop. A little skip in his step like he won a consolation prize.

“Birthday,” he says after he clears his throat. “Tell me your birthday.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I told you mine.”

“No you didn’t.”

“You can always search mine in Naver. I can’t search yours.”

He looks thoughtful for a while before he adds, “And please don’t lie about this one cause I know you were lying quite a few times back there,” he gestures to the bench, “Or not telling me the whole truth.”

Chaeyoung is at loss of words.

The bus turns and screeches and halts at the bus stop. The door opens with a calm hum and an annoying sound of rubber meeting glass. Chaeyoung looks at it and then at Jeon Jeongguk then back at it. She slowly steps closer.

“It’s 23rd of April, 1999.”

Jeon Jeongguk looks satisfied for a moment before a realization dawns on his face and his eyes get so comically wide Chaeyoung almost laugh. He looks like big overgrown bunny who’s not aware of the devastation he causes.

He opens his mouth, saying something, but the driver honks at the same time, startling them both.

Chaeyoung hops on the bus, takes one step inside when the door slowly closes behind her. And as it does, Jeon Jeongguk shouts to defy the rubber on glass sound. She turns to see him as the bus leaves.

“You should’ve called me oppa! You keep referring to me as ‘You’!”

“No way!” She shouts back through the little slit of the door, eyes crinkling, hoping that he somehow hears her voice for the last time. Hoping that in the future he would recall just how fond she sounds, and remember her as such.

*

**_Cheoin-gu, Early Winter of 2020_ **

Winter break has arrived and Chaeyoung, as per tradition, spends the break in the house she grew up in. Much more modernized with automatic heater and electric stove now, but still, it smells and feels like the house in her memory.

Her mum will be coming too, bus just departed from Incheon an hour ago. Jeonghoon can’t make it this year because he will be on TV, with his group mates attending award shows and performing even though they wouldn’t be getting any rookie awards. He told her that via phone call on her way here and she had quipped saying, “Well why are you surprised?”

He cursed at her as she laughed.

When she arrived her grandparents welcomed her and immediately asked to see her diploma, which burned all the way from Seoul to Gyeonggi-do in her backpack as if excited to present itself to her grandparents. And she joked that it is, from now on, will be acting as the granddaughter in the place of Son Chaeyoung.

“Son Chaeyoung herself will be retiring and sleep all year,” she had said when her grandmother shoved her inside to get warm.

The day has been jolly. She’s thinking of staying here until January, then come back to Seoul just in time for the interview she’s been scheduled for after her application got accepted a mere week ago. For the first time in her life, she can finally name the feeling of success. The feeling of actually achieving something in the way she believes is right.

Content, she believes, is the word.

The stars finally aligning and all that bull.

_Fate is not nonsense, or as you said, bull._

Oh, and she still thinks about Jeon Jeongguk. Is that pathetic? It seems to her that it is. Because sometimes she can’t help but smile as she lays in bed thinking about his wide betrayed eyes when he found out she was younger than him. Can’t help grinning when the image of him introducing himself flashes when she sees the gigantic billboard of him holding out a can of orange soda. Can’t help but wonder how he is and if he thinks of her too.

It’s pathetic and embarrassing but so uncharacteristic of her, she doesn’t mind at all. Such is Jeon Jeongguk’s effect on her. Not letting her live her life peacefully, but somehow makes it even better. This little secret tucked inside her, preserved all through the seasons.

She even brings it to Cheoin-gu, and eats her grandmother’s dumpling with it.

“Chae? Katarina?”

She choked and coughed and lost her breath before she could answer.

“Yes, grandma?”

“I forgot there’s a package for you. A big one.”

“Looks like a frame. Was very heavy. It took the two of us to carry it inside,” Grandpa says from the lawn where he’s harvesting the carrots.

Chaeyoung finishes her bowl, then stalks into the room where her grandmother store shoes and winter clothes.

There it was, leaning on the wall as Chaeyoung’s heart pounds without her knowing why.

She inspects the date it was sent, and it shocks her when it says that it was sent in April. A week. A week after that meeting with Jeon Jeongguk.

She bites her nails as she stares at it as if it’s some kind of an alien object for awhile before she finally gets on her knees and rips the wrapping paper slowly. The front of a box came into view almost immediately and her heart leaps when she sees a Hannam address plastered on it. Not like she’s been stalking Jeon Jeongguk on the internet or anything.

She pulls the package closer, careful in the ways she’s opening the tape, one by one all the way to the end, then lays the box down on the floor.

She breathes. _One, two, one, two, three_ , then pulls the flaps to see what’s inside.

She cannot be less prepared for what she’s seeing right now.

There, inside the sizable box, surrounded in its enclave of white cottons, is a framed painting of a blue goldfish, big and shiny, with a star near its mouth. It shimmers as it looks like it’s painted in glittery fancy paint. The background is fresh white, unblemished.

Her hands trembles as she holds it, inspecting it for more details to view. She flips it to see the back and discovers a small message written in black.

_Had to transfer it somewhere before I forget it! :)_

_Happy Birthday, Son Chaeyoung-ssi. I hope the stars align for you as you read this._

_From: Boy from the bus shelter you should’ve called oppa._

**Author's Note:**

> With the power of peer pressures (or more like sisters pressures) and crackship, this fic is finally here. Somehow. Hope you like it.


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